Cloud9 (C9) is a North American eSports team formed by the former roster of Quantic Gaming following its dissolution. The team currently competes under the name Cloud9 G2A, in representation of their sponsor G2A. Aside from League of Legends, the organization also has divisions for DotA 2, COD, Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, Super Smash Bros, Counter Strike: Global Offensive, Overwatch, and Vainglory.

Biography

Pre-Season 3

During the off-season, the Quantic Gaming organization fell into financial distress and shut down operations, leaving the League of Legends team without a sponsor once again. Competing under the name "Team NomNom" and then Cloud9, Nientonsoh, Hai, Yazuki, Wild Turtle and LemonNation secured a spot in the Season 3 North American Offline Qualifier for the League of Legends Championship Series. However, Cloud9 was knocked out of the tournament in the group stage after losing to Azure Gaming and future LCS team Team MRN.

Initially, Nientonsoh said that Cloud9 would disband in light of the loss. The team later decided to stay together, although Nientonsoh and Yazuki did leave, causing a large roster change. Hai shifted from jungle to mid, and the team tried out new junglers and top laners in online competitions.

Season 3

On April 1st, the Cloud9 roster of Hai, LemonNation, Meteos, and Balls was picked up by Quantic Gaming. However, just a few weeks later the roster would once again become Cloud9 with previous TSM manager Jack Etienne becoming their manager and owner of the team. In the Summer Promotion Qualifier, Cloud9 went 5-0 to earn a spot in the LCS Summer Split, beating Team Astral Poke 2-0, and compLexity 3-0. Cloud9 possesses the longest win streak in LCS history (13 games), the most victories in an LCS season split (25 games), and won first place in the Summer Split. Throughout the NA LCS Summer Playoffs, they were able to win every single one of their games/sets, first against Team Dignitas and then the grand finals against TSM. Cloud9 took home $50,000 USD as well a first round bye at the Season 3 World Championship. They finished their season 3 LCS and playoffs with a 30-3 total, the highest in LCS history and with a 91% win rate.

With high hopes, C9 went straight into the S3 Championship quarterfinals for being the North American champions. Their first international match as a team was against the top European seed, Fnatic. In a formidable set of games, Cloud9 lost 1-2, being the last North American team to be eliminated and ending up in eighth place.

2014 Pre-season

On October 29th, it was announced that while Alex Penn leaves, Dan Dinh would join as new coach.

At the first international pre-season tournament, IEM Cologne in November, Cloud9 received a bye into the second round and competed against Gambit Gaming of Russia. Gambit defeated Cloud9 2-0, marking their second immediate exit from an international tournament.

In December 2013, Cloud9 joined four other North American LCS teams at the Battle of the Atlantic, facing European champions Fnatic for the second time. With dominating performances by mid laner Hai, Cloud9 took the series 2-0, resulting in an overall North American win at the tournament and $10,000 USD for the team.

2014 Season

Cloud9 won the spring split of the LCS once again, and qualifying for the All Star event. However, prior to the event, Hai's lung collapsed, hospitalizing him and requiring him to use a respirator, and the team had to play with a substitute. After C9 requested Link as a temporary replacement, Counter Logic Gaming readily agreed to a two-month emergency loan deal that would cover the time in between splits, including All-Stars. Cloud9 went 3-1 in the group stage, losing only to SK Telecom T1 K, but in the bracket they were eliminated in the first round by OMG, losing 2-0.

In the summer season, despite placing first in the round robin, they took second place overall, losing to Team SoloMid in the finals 2-3. The second-place finish qualified them for the 2014 Season World Championship, where they were drawn into Group D along with NaJin White Shield, Alliance, and KaBuM! e-Sports. Cloud9 went 4-2 in the group, drawing with NaJin Shield for first place but losing the tiebreaker game. They were eliminated from the tournament in the bracket stage, falling 3-1 to Samsung Blue.

2015 Preseason

Cloud9 was the North American team fan-voted to IEM San Jose. They defeated paiN Gaming 2-0, Alliance 2-1, and then Unicorns of Love 3-0 to win the tournament.

On December 30th, it was announced that Cloud9 were holding open tryouts for a North American Challenger team. See information about this team at Cloud9 Tempest.

2015 Season

Due to their IEM San Jose victory, Cloud9 qualified for IEM Katowice in March. They lost their only two games, first to GE Tigers and then to yoe Flash Wolves, and finished in 7th/8th place. Domestically, they underperformed at the start of the season, and were in 8th place at the end of the second week of the spring LCS split. However, they improved over the course of the season, ending with a second-place finish behind Team SoloMid and a playoff bye; after beating Team Liquid 3-2, Cloud9 lost to TSM 1-3 in the finals and finished the split overall in second place.

Soon after the spring finals, Hai announced his retirement from professional play, citing his wrist injuries and the fact that his support carry playstyle was not viable anymore as reasons for his retirement; however, he would remain with the Cloud9 organization as their Chief Gaming Officer. After tryouts including Cloud9 Tempest mid laner Yusui and the recently-unbanned European solo queue star Incarnati0n, the team settled on Incarnati0n as their new mid laner for the Summer Split. The team performed poorly for the first five weeks of the split and replaced Meteos with Hai going into the sixth week.

With Hai back on the team, Cloud9's record improved from 3-7 to 6-12 by the end of the split, and they finished in 7th place after a tie-breaker victory against Team 8, narrowly avoiding relegations and retaining their 70 Championship Points, though they did not qualify for playoffs. In the Regional Finals Gauntlet, Cloud9 reverse-swept both Gravity Gaming and Team Impulse before beating Team Liquid 3-1 in the finals. Their fourteen games played over the course of three days gave them North America's third seed to the 2015 Season World Championship, Cloud9's third-consecutive Worlds.

Considered an underdog at Worlds, Cloud9 were placed into Group B along with Fnatic, ahq, and Invictus Gaming and expected to place last. Instead, they surprised with an undefeated 3-0 first week, with Hai suddenly performing well on Lee Sin and Balls on Darius; Incarnati0n also introduced Veigar as a pick in their first game against ahq. In the second week, Cloud9 needed only one win to advance to the quarterfinals but were unable to find it, losing four games in a row including a tiebreaker loss to ahq. They placed third in their group, ahead of only Invictus Gaming.

2016 Preseason

After their Worlds run, Cloud9 announced the retirement of LemonNation and his move to a staff role; they also opened tryouts for jungler and support, with Hai to play whichever role was not filled via a tryout. They ended up adding two new players - former Gravity support Bunny FuFuu and Team Impulse jungler Rush - with Hai to split time with Bunny in the support role. Rush debuted with the team at IEM Cologne, where they were eliminated in the first round by H2k.

2016 Season

Cloud9 started the spring season with Hai and Bunny FuFuu alternating games, but after two losses with Bunny and two wins with Hai, they committed to starting Hai full-time and rose to a 67% winrate, with a third-place seed in the playoffs. However, despite a seeding advantage, the team lost to sixth-seed TSM in the first round. After the end of the split, Cloud9 recreated its Challenger team and shuffled rosters between the two teams, initially setting up for the summer split with Impact, Meteos, Jensen, Sneaky, and Bunny FuFuu as its LCS roster; former Team Dragon Knights support Smoothie later also joined the team.

For the first seven weeks of the split, Bunny FuFuu and Smoothie shared the support role, but after that point Bunny stepped down to a substitute and streaming role, and Smoothie became the full-time starter. The team equaled its spring record with a 12-6 finish, again securing the third seed into the playoffs. There, Cloud9 defeated Team EnVyUs and Immortals before falling to TSM 3-1 in the finals; their second-place result was their best placement since Spring 2015. In the Regional Finals, or the gauntlet, Cloud9 faced and defeated both EnVyUs and Immortals to qualify for the World Championship for the fourth consecutive year.

The team was placed into Group B together with SK Telecom T1, Flash Wolves and I May. The North American powerhouse walked on the edge of elimination until the very last game of the Group Stage: Meteos, Jensen and Sneaky had rough games, and Impact wasn't able to snowball an early advantage into a game-winning splitpush threat on his signature Gnar, as he did in the NALCS Playoffs. In the end managed to clutch a Quarterfinals berth after two difficult weeks of competition, placing second with a 3-3 score and thus becoming the first North American team since 2014 to place in the Top 8 at Worlds after North America had been shut out of the playoffs in 2015. They were drawn into the right side of the playoff bracket, where they met Samsung Galaxy and were swept 0-3 by the Korean team.

2017 Season

Before the spring split of the 2017 NA LCS, Cloud9 made only one starting roster change, with Cloud9 Challenger jungler Contractz starting, while Meteos stepped down to a substitute position. Top laner Ray of Apex Gaming (now Dignitas) became a substitute for the team.

In the 2017 Spring NA LCS, Cloud9 competed against Hai, Balls, and LemonNation, who made up three-fifths of the original Cloud9 LCS roster, as part of FlyQuest.

As the best-performing NA team at the 2016 Season World Championship, Cloud9 received an invitation to the IEM World Championship; however, two weeks before the competition, C9 withdrew from the tournament, citing their priority to focus on continuing their then-dominant performances in the NA LCS, as well as the political uncertainty of the environment regarding travel by persons with visas.